San Andreas Fault
1
4.9
- proper noun
:
Falla de San Andrés
- The quake will continue to move across the continent, decimating Colorado and Utah, and building intensity until it reaches the edge, right there, of the North American plate, where it will trigger earthquakes right along the San Andreas Fault.
- San Andreas Fault in California
- plates along the San Andreas Fault
- southern San Andreas Fault
Examples
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Part of the problem is that in the most dangerous areas, like the San Andreas Fault in California, the Earth shakes pretty much constantly.
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The San Andreas Fault is infamous for causing significant seismic activity throughout California.
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Are you saying you think the whole San Andreas fault might go off?
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All along the San Andreas fault.
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Well, the San Andreas fault runs right up the spine of California.
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The San Andreas Fault is shifting.
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With the San Andreas Fault in California, the Pacific plate is moving past the North American plate at a known rate.
Academic text (2006) -
It looks like the whole San Andreas fault line is being activated.
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And we think that's the result of the earthquake on the San Andreas Fault, relieving the strain on all the parallel faults.
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Geophysicists measuring the relative velocity of crustal plates along the San Andreas Fault need positions down to a few millimeters or better.
Academic text (1996)
Surface Forms
Morphology
San + Andreas + fault
The noun 'fault' clearly signals a tectonic fracture, so a learner who knows the constituents can infer this is a fault named 'San Andreas' (i.e. a place-name + fault). However, the proper-name elements 'San' and 'Andreas' do not add compositional semantic information about location or seismic significance, so the full encyclopedic meaning (major fault in California, runs from San Diego to San Francisco, known for strong earthquakes) is not derivable from the parts alone.
Etymology
San Andreas Fault is the name for a long crack under California, named after a local place called San Andreas. The word fault means a 'break' in the ground, and imagining two large pieces of land sliding past each other helps you remember why this break causes 'earthquakes'.